Harvard Student's Letter Reveals Terror of Campus Life After Sexual Assault
An anonymous letter from a Harvard undergrad, published in the school's newspaper this week, points out the ways that colleges and universities are failing their students who are victims of sexual assault.
"This morning, as I swallowed my three blue pills of Sertraline and tried to forget about the nightmares that haunted my night," wrote the student in the Harvard Crimson, "I finally admitted it to myself: I have lost my battle against this institution."
In the letter, titled "Dear Harvard: You Win," the young woman talks about how she was raped by a classmate at Harvard. After the incident, she claims she tried to pursue campus justice against her attacker, only to be foiled at every turn by the school's complicated bureaucracy. She adds, she was unable to get the man kicked out of the dorm they both lived in, causing her to become more and more depressed as she didn't want to leave her room for fear of running into him. (A Harvard spokesperson has not responded to Yahoo Shine's request for comment.)
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Harvard isn't the only American university coming under fire for mishandling rape cases on campus. Multiple current and former students at LA's Occidental College are suing the university, saying that their assaults were either ignored or lost in the school's justice system. At the University of North Carolina, one young woman claims that she was threatened with expulsion for "intimidating" her alleged rapist. How was she intimidating him? By speaking publicly about what had happened to her, even though she never identified him by name.
Why have so many colleges recently come under fire for the way that they handle rape and assault investigations? Part of the problem is that universities make their own codes of ethics, forcing students to handle issues within the school system instead of going to the police.
These private tribunals and campus courts are not subject to the same laws as US courts, and instead of going to jail people who are found guilty are given academic punishments. These complicated procedures can often take long periods of time, which means that some students may graduate without having seen their day in court. Many universities are also not equipped to counsel the young women who have been attacked, some of whom – like the Harvard letter writer – are coping with depression, anxiety, and/or PTSD.
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But thanks to the high-profile nature of some of the cases and an outpouring of support online and in the media – including a pulled-from-the-headlines episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit - even President Obama has taken notice of the growing problem of rape on college campuses.
In January, the president announced that he was organizing a task force specifically focusing on campus sexual assaults. That task force was given 90 days to prepare and present a plan for dealing with the issue. The deadline looms later this spring – but for many, like the anonymous Harvard letter writer, it's already too late.
